Financial Review: Community West Bancshares (NASDAQ:CWBC) & Beneficient (NASDAQ:BENF)

Community West Bancshares (NASDAQ:CWBC) and Beneficient (NASDAQ:BENF) are both small-cap finance companies, but which is the superior stock? We will compare the two companies based on the strength of their valuation, dividends, profitability, earnings, risk, analyst recommendations and institutional ownership.

Institutional and Insider Ownership

33.8% of Community West Bancshares shares are owned by institutional investors. Comparatively, 90.6% of Beneficient shares are owned by institutional investors. 10.6% of Community West Bancshares shares are owned by insiders. Comparatively, 13.7% of Beneficient shares are owned by insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that hedge funds, large money managers and endowments believe a company is poised for long-term growth.

Profitability

This table compares Community West Bancshares and Beneficient’s net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
Community West Bancshares	13.88%	7.91%	0.82%
Beneficient	N/A	N/A	N/A

Valuation and Earnings

This table compares Community West Bancshares and Beneficient”s top-line revenue, earnings per share (EPS) and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	Net Income	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
Community West Bancshares	$166.83 million	2.45	$7.67 million	$1.39	15.36
Beneficient	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A

Community West Bancshares has higher revenue and earnings than Beneficient.

Volatility & Risk

Community West Bancshares has a beta of 0.9, meaning that its stock price is 10% less volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, Beneficient has a beta of -0.52, meaning that its stock price is 152% less volatile than the S&P 500.

Analyst Ratings

This is a breakdown of recent ratings and recommmendations for Community West Bancshares and Beneficient, as provided by MarketBeat.com.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
Community West Bancshares	0	2	2	0	2.50
Beneficient	0	0	0	0	0.00

Community West Bancshares currently has a consensus price target of $21.67, suggesting a potential upside of 1.48%. Given Community West Bancshares’ stronger consensus rating and higher probable upside, equities analysts plainly believe Community West Bancshares is more favorable than Beneficient.

Summary

Community West Bancshares beats Beneficient on 8 of the 10 factors compared between the two stocks.

About Community West Bancshares

Community West Bancshares operates as the bank holding company for Community West Bank, N.A. that provides various financial products and services in California. The company offers deposit products, such as checking accounts, savings accounts, money market accounts, and fixed rate and fixed maturity certificates of deposits; and cash management products. It also provides commercial, commercial real estate, consumer, manufactured housing, and small business administration loans, as well as agricultural loans for real estate and operating lines; home equity lines of credit collateralized by residential real estate; single family real estate loans; and installment loans consisting of automobile and general-purpose loans. The company serves small to medium-sized businesses and their owners, professionals, high-net worth individuals, and non-profit organizations. Community West Bancshares was founded in 1989 and is headquartered in Goleta, California.

About Beneficient

Beneficient, a technology-enabled financial services company, provides liquidity solutions and related trustee, custody and trust administrative services to participants in the alternative asset industry in the United States. It operates through Ben Liquidity, Ben Custody, and Customer ExAlt Trusts segments. The company offers Ben AltAccess platform for secure, online, and end-to-end delivery of each of the Ben business unit products and services, including upload documents, and work through tasks, and complete their transactions with standardized transaction agreements. It also provides Ben Liquidity, which offers alternative asset liquidity and fiduciary financing products; Ben Custody that provides custody and trust administration services to trustees and document custodian services to customers; and Ben Markets, which provides broker-dealer and transfer agency services. In addition, the company provides Ben Insurance Services, which offers insurance products and services; and Ben Data that provides data collection, evaluation, and analytics products and services. It serves individual and institutional investors, wealth advisors, and general partners. Beneficient is based in Dallas, Texas.